News Implementation of a dedicated mission server

[EWanderer]

I mean we already have large scale cargo mission, it is called Wing-Missions. But as we all know the reward is calculated around a 4 person wing. If they made them so, that they award for a 4 person wing and just shared this pool for every commander assigned to the wing based on their contribution. I mean there are other issues with Missions, such as reduced variance in certain states and over all rarity for small outpost. All of these they should look into and I made a suggestion about it earlier with a few ideas:
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...ed-servers-FDev-for-an-Mission-Board-Overhaul!

 

[spiresofillusion]

You didn't answer my question.

Let me reveal the greatest secret of Elite to you now:

You can take missions to MULTIPLE DESTINATIONS at the same time!

I know, right?! :O Shock horror!

So if you have a Beluga with gazillion of passenger cabins, you can take 3 missions to system A, 2 missions to system B and 5 missions to system C. That way you will fill your ship with passenger missions, voila! You don't even need to relog, just visit all the stations in the system you're in and fill her up!

Unless, you of course want an instant gratification and a guarantee that ALL of the missions in the station will always be generated to the same destination. If that's the case, I honestly think you picked a wrong game to play dude.

Oh thank You very much for this very enlightening hint full of wisdom, Sir. Never thought about it, this completely changes everything! :O

The problem is, however, that it very often doesn't work this way. Yesterday i did some missions again, after an exploration trip which began as a hasty take off from the Gnosis [smile]. I wanted to get the system permit for Terra Mater and being still in my exploration fitted AspX, data delivery, surface scan and small cargo missions were the only missions i was really able to do. I didn't even try to get missions to the same destination, still it took me quite a few board flips to get 18 missions of this type. Obviously i could have get more cargo delivery missions, since you can now do those partially which is a really great improvement. (I haven't play the game for quite a long time) However, i explicitly didn't want to repeatedly return to Hecate since its not worth the time.

Additionally, you suggest that even if one takes missions to different destinations, one should normally still end up with a few missions per single destination, in fact around 3 per system in your example (which would be an acceptable ratio in my opinion). I ended up with 15 systems. Now 6/5 missions per system is pretty close to one if you ask me. So your example would be more appropriate as "Take 10 missions to 10 different systems A through J". And as i said, it already took board flips to get a sufficient number, such that i very probably could achieve my goal without repeatedly returning to my starting point.

Now you could obviously argue that my premise was wrong from the start, since i set a clear goal (getting allied with a local faction) i wanted to achieve in bounded time frame (one evening) without a general pupose ship. This obviously reduces my options by making all missions not offered by a single local faction and missions not fitting my ships criteria irrelevant. Leaving my personal opinion aside, that such arguments which mark a playstyle "wrong" are per se arrogant at best, Elite seems to encourage a roleplay type of playstyle. Thus, having the desire to support a single faction in a ship with a very narrow purpose is valid from the game perspective. Doing this in a tight time frame is a valid demand from the real life perspective. I once read a post on the forum written by a cmdr with something around 6500 ingame hours which is equivalent to around 4.5 hours a day every day from the game launch. Most people simply can't play that much but should also be able to achieve their goals. Now, i was able to get the system permit yesterday, although it took me much longer than i expected but it also remembered me of the awful mission system. Finally, without board flipping i certainly wouldn't be able to get the allied status in one evening and achieve this goal, which is very modest one considering such things as Fed/Empire rank, obtaining the vette or cutter, Shinrarta Dezhra access, Engineers, Powerplay etc.

Apologies for the sarcastic introduction btw, no insult intended.

 

[Six6VI]

How is that relevant? You are not a 3rd Party Logistics company. You are a random guy with a truck, trying to make a buck.
Only a tiny, tiny fraction of world goods are available to random guys with trucks, as it is in Elite. The major difference between Elite and RL is that you can't get a semi-permanent contract with the companies in Elite, only stay an independent guy with a truck.

It's relevant because the 3rd party logistics provider is the faction representative in the station with the missions.

They in turn are reliant on independent guys with trucks for a lot of the urgent jobs that are left over when the regular delivery drivers have left with the anticipated daily loads but if you'd prefer I guess FDev can just decide only employees can deliver cargo instead of allied, elite pilots that just happen to show up on the doorstep.

Since we're all flying around in registered space vehicles there is an insurance recourse for the mission giver if a load is lost, and the premium profits on the job make it worth passing some of that on to non-employees when logistics providers cannot keep up with demand.

Meh, the customer won't care, and why would someone want to try and please them, in any way possible to gain competitive advantage.

Ever worked in warehousing, despatch or driven a truck?

[Edit: The point being, there is LOADS of work]

 

[Riverside]

Ever worked in warehousing, despatch or driven a truck?

[Edit: The point being, there is LOADS of work]

For a successful company. In ED you are an independent trader, you have to find the work.

 

[Six6VI]

Already invested many hours trying to explain the concepts of consumer demand generating massive amounts of work and mission relevance for the Elite player earlier in this thread.

See previous comments, Ima go play the game instead of the forums.

 

[rootsrat]

Oh thank You very much for this very enlightening hint full of wisdom, Sir. Never thought about it, this completely changes everything! :O

The problem is, however, that it very often doesn't work this way. Yesterday i did some missions again, after an exploration trip which began as a hasty take off from the Gnosis [smile]. I wanted to get the system permit for Terra Mater and being still in my exploration fitted AspX, data delivery, surface scan and small cargo missions were the only missions i was really able to do. I didn't even try to get missions to the same destination, still it took me quite a few board flips to get 18 missions of this type. Obviously i could have get more cargo delivery missions, since you can now do those partially which is a really great improvement. (I haven't play the game for quite a long time) However, i explicitly didn't want to repeatedly return to Hecate since its not worth the time.

Additionally, you suggest that even if one takes missions to different destinations, one should normally still end up with a few missions per single destination, in fact around 3 per system in your example (which would be an acceptable ratio in my opinion). I ended up with 15 systems. Now 6/5 missions per system is pretty close to one if you ask me. So your example would be more appropriate as "Take 10 missions to 10 different systems A through J". And as i said, it already took board flips to get a sufficient number, such that i very probably could achieve my goal without repeatedly returning to my starting point.

Now you could obviously argue that my premise was wrong from the start, since i set a clear goal (getting allied with a local faction) i wanted to achieve in bounded time frame (one evening) without a general pupose ship. This obviously reduces my options by making all missions not offered by a single local faction and missions not fitting my ships criteria irrelevant. Leaving my personal opinion aside, that such arguments which mark a playstyle "wrong" are per se arrogant at best, Elite seems to encourage a roleplay type of playstyle. Thus, having the desire to support a single faction in a ship with a very narrow purpose is valid from the game perspective. Doing this in a tight time frame is a valid demand from the real life perspective. I once read a post on the forum written by a cmdr with something around 6500 ingame hours which is equivalent to around 4.5 hours a day every day from the game launch. Most people simply can't play that much but should also be able to achieve their goals. Now, i was able to get the system permit yesterday, although it took me much longer than i expected but it also remembered me of the awful mission system. Finally, without board flipping i certainly wouldn't be able to get the allied status in one evening and achieve this goal, which is very modest one considering such things as Fed/Empire rank, obtaining the vette or cutter, Shinrarta Dezhra access, Engineers, Powerplay etc.

Apologies for the sarcastic introduction btw, no insult intended.

That's OK, I can take a lot more than that

I think the "I want it now" attitude is what gets people. Elite is just not that kind of game. It's slow progress, that's just how it is designed. You may like it or not, but that's the FACT - progress in Elite is slow by design.

I never said that any playstyle is wrong. I'm only saying that setting unrealistic expectations for the game and then complaining about is not the game's fault. The game is not perfect, it has it's flaws obviously, but to expect a completely different kind of design, where the actual design is completely different is on player.

Imagine if I went to GTA V Online forums and started to complain that all I want is to role play a lawful citizen of Liberty City. But I can't, because the only options that the game offers are illegal activities. And all the other players keep killing me all the time, where all I want is some peaceful interaction.

It's that kind of stuff that's happening here.

 

[Dash]

I'm sure at page 86 this will fall on deaf ears.

I'm all for removing board flipping, I've used it - probably about 2.8% of my play time I do it... It's not frequent, but it is necessary if you're focusing on a task.

What I would like to see, is a correction to the need for board flipping in the first place. The reason people board flip is to stack similar type of missions. The solution should be to provide another mechanism for supplying this requirement. I do not see there is any substantial argument against simply racking up the number of missions of each type astronomically, maybe with some filters in place to handle it.

Looking for boom time delivery? Well here's twenty.

But there's also twenty passenger missions to star X that you know pays out really well if you can fill your ship up (because as airliners know all too well, it's not efficient to only partially fill your passenger places, they simply don't run services if there is no demand).

The only reason to not do this, IMHO, is the perverse "the grind is gameplay". Restricting access to things in game is not gameplay, it's a frustration for all. Gameplay is making delivering those twenty missions tricky.

 

[Six6VI]

progress in Elite is slow by design.

I'll second that wisdom, after 9326* hours...

*Steam logged into launcher. The game says 46+ weeks.

 

[rootsrat]

I'm sure at page 86 this will fall on deaf ears.

I'm all for removing board flipping, I've used it - probably about 2.8% of my play time I do it... It's not frequent, but it is necessary if you're focusing on a task.

What I would like to see, is a correction to the need for board flipping in the first place. The reason people board flip is to stack similar type of missions. The solution should be to provide another mechanism for supplying this requirement. I do not see there is any substantial argument against simply racking up the number of missions of each type astronomically, maybe with some filters in place to handle it.

Looking for boom time delivery? Well here's twenty.

But there's also twenty passenger missions to star X that you know pays out really well if you can fill your ship up (because as airliners know all too well, it's not efficient to only partially fill your passenger places, they simply don't run services if there is no demand).

The only reason to not do this, IMHO, is the perverse "the grind is gameplay". Restricting access to things in game is not gameplay, it's a frustration for all. Gameplay is making delivering those twenty missions tricky.

We've already had that with Robigo or Re-Loggo or whatever is was called... Where people took 20 missions from there back to the bubble and then complained that they have way too many NPC's sent after them.

It's a hopeless cause.

The number of missions on the board could be certainly higher. But 20 delivery missions on demand, because someone can't be arsed flying to another station or take missions to 4 different systems instead of 1? Oh gawd, please no!

 

[Arguendo]

Ever worked in warehousing, despatch or driven a truck?

Yes, for two different companies. Not one of them gave any jobs to a random guy with a truck that showed up at the front desk.

 

[EWanderer]

We've already had that with Robigo or Re-Loggo or whatever is was called... Where people took 20 missions from there back to the bubble and then complained that they have way too many NPC's sent after them.

It's a hopeless cause.

The number of missions on the board could be certainly higher. But 20 delivery missions on demand, because someone can't be flying to another station or take missions to 4 different systems instead of 1? Oh gawd, please no!

I mean I for one just want to find Missions for the Activity I want to do, without having to fly between a dozen super-populated systems with large stations for. And then having to restack Reputation, when I only got a few hours to play per week, just to have BGS mess with me, becuase the station decides to go to war. And I don't speak for the community in that regard, but it is for me at least a reason to flip mission boards as of now and extra payout doesn't help me.

So I really wished FDev would use this opportunity just to get a better feel, why the people, who board flip, flip their boards and then maybe see if they can fix such issues.

 

[rootsrat]

I mean I for one just want to find Missions for the Activity I want to do, without having to fly between a dozen super-populated systems with large stations for. And then having to restack Reputation, when I only got a few hours to play per week, just to have BGS mess with me, becuase the station decides to go to war. And I don't speak for the community in that regard, but it is for me at least a reason to flip mission boards as of now and extra payout doesn't help me.

So I really wished FDev would use this opportunity just to get a better feel, why the people, who board flip, flip their boards and then maybe see if they can fix such issues.

But again - I think the design of the game is that you don't always get what you want and you need to adjust your activities to the offered missions.

Also - why do you need missions to do your activities? Some can only be done via missions - true. But some others don't.

 

[EWanderer]

But again - I think the design of the game is that you don't always get what you want and you need to adjust your activities to the offered missions.
Also - why do you need missions to do your activities? Some can only be done via missions - true. But some others don't.

I mean the missions are given out at random (if you ignore some state specific situtations like war). But space is big and flying around doing nothing, but searching for stuff to do without any indicator isn't really fun if you only play 1-2 hrs per day at best.

And what of it, then I started I made my first Type-9 in a Cobra by doing salvage missions(at this point there were no megaships to farm stuff from), because I loved the practice for scooping cargo and did just more than pointing towards station carrying cargo. And whenever the 4 Factions I worked did go to war or just run out of mission I put the game away for weeks until salvage missions where back.

So FDev should either guarntee, that large stations offer every activity or give players the tools to better search for a place, that suite their current want for specific mission types(aside from kill and import food/medicine).

Just look at a war board, filled to the brim with duplicate kill missions, then there are so many activites in a war, that should be doable for a faction, such as weapon sourcing, black box salvage or resuces and evacuation of civilians.

And all of this doesn't even account for ship size. I mean tell me if there is a reliable way to find missions for small vessels aside from going to outposts, which also can sometimes spawn missons better suited for large ships or at least fully dedicated ship(because of cargo size or combat difficulty), just because of my high ranking/reputation.

 

[rootsrat]

Thanks for elaborating - it definitely makes more sense now!

I mean the missions are given out at random (if you ignore some state specific situtations like war). But space is big and flying around doing nothing, but searching for stuff to do without any indicator isn't really fun if you only play 1-2 hrs per day at best.

Definitely agree on this one. Maybe a good compromise between "Give me 20 passenger missions NOW" and "Here's a bunch of totally random missions" would be some sort of a search tool, where you input the type of missions you're interested in and the game gives you some locations within X LY radius? Thinking lore friendly here - Pilots Federation is supposed to be this powerful organisation with access to information. Maybe they should start providing that information to Commanders?

 

[EWanderer]

Thanks for elaborating - it definitely makes more sense now!



Definitely agree on this one. Maybe a good compromise between "Give me 20 passenger missions NOW" and "Here's a bunch of totally random missions" would be some sort of a search tool, where you input the type of missions you're interested in and the game gives you some locations within X LY radius? Thinking lore friendly here - Pilots Federation is supposed to be this powerful organisation with access to information. Maybe they should start providing that information to Commanders?

Exactly this, we can buy trade data, but being able to get at least pointer towards the next stop for Type X missions is to big of a data chunk? If that is to hard to do, maybe change the spawn mechanic for large station for heavy populated system to give at least 2 missionsof every type across the board on the days first boards. So I can do at least 2 missions of my activity, then come back and head towards the next large mission board, thus cyceling around a fixed route for activites.

 

[spiresofillusion]

That's OK, I can take a lot more than that

I think the "I want it now" attitude is what gets people. Elite is just not that kind of game. It's slow progress, that's just how it is designed. You may like it or not, but that's the FACT - progress in Elite is slow by design.

I never said that any playstyle is wrong. I'm only saying that setting unrealistic expectations for the game and then complaining about is not the game's fault. The game is not perfect, it has it's flaws obviously, but to expect a completely different kind of design, where the actual design is completely different is on player.

Imagine if I went to GTA V Online forums and started to complain that all I want is to role play a lawful citizen of Liberty City. But I can't, because the only options that the game offers are illegal activities. And all the other players keep killing me all the time, where all I want is some peaceful interaction.

It's that kind of stuff that's happening here.

I agree with you that wrong expectations are indeed often a huge part of the problem. And in many discussed subjects on the forum they are the very heart of the topic. I mean, atmospheric landings or devs allowing player to explore unfinished systems - come on...

But in this case we speak about a feature - may it be a tolerated bug or working as intended - which has been ingame for a long time. It still desn't allow an instantaneous progression, you still have to do your system-to-system runs, you still have to go to the planet sites if you want to scan installations and you also still have to kill those absurd amounts of enemy ships in kill missions, therefore all gameplay elements are in place.

The only thing you don't have to do is backtracking after successfully finishing a hand full of missions every 30 mins to get new ones, or alternatively let your ship sit there on the pad and do stuff outside of the game waiting to spawn enough new missions. And to be honest, i wouldn't mind to go back to a station more often if there would be a meaningful reason to do this, or if the time for jumping back, supercruising and docking would be negligible. A lot of games want you to go back to some place on and on, but usually this is connected to some kind of staged narrative, which will definitively never be in ED. Here, i completely realize that ED is in fact a game, where exaggerating Mass Effect-like storytelling for one player or fast travel mechanics are misplaced. So backtracking in order to establish a romantic relationship with an engineer will (hopefully) never be a thing

Obviously at this point you could argue, that i very well could try to pick up some stuff to sell to the port where i'm getting the missions and therefore make the backtracking a meaningful gameplay experience but this again feels somewhat ridiculous, if i'm in a combat or exploring ship not even speaking abount fully utilized passenger transport ships.

So i'm strongly opposed to the claim, that people who have the opinion that board flipping should have some kind of meaningful ingame replacement, be it a refresh button or just a significantly larger amount of missions etc, want just instant progression. In fact, i think FDevs announcement of the 10% increase in payouts is somewhat irritating. Assuming that my intentions are not different from the majority of other cmdrs who used this system, its way more important to just being able to run meaningful missions. Additionally, just as nobody forces you to take more than one mission at the board given more than one is present, nobody forces you to board flip.

Obviously you can exploit such systems and since Elite is based on the idea of a multiplayer game, such things can become annoying to other players. But considering the status quo of the game in combination with the fact that the flipping mechanic was present all the time, i don't see that it affects the bgs in a meaningful way, on the other side for me it is an overall improvement of gameplay experience, although obviously awfully realized.

Btw i didn't want to imply that you specifically try to impose your playstyle on others. Its just usually if someone criticizes the progression speed in Elite even so slightly, there is always a cmdr shouting "You're playing wrong!", wielding torches, pitchforks and deploying pulse lasers, which i wanted to anticipate.

 

[Genus]

That's such a silly argument.

What if "my way of playing" is to press a button and immediately get 10 billion credits? I can't do that? Well, this game must suck.

As is also present in Rootstrats "counter-point" (if you can call it that), to the definition of "Play your way". I'm not convinced either of you get to call anyone silly, if you're both just going to pull that one out of the magic hat.



They are quite obviously not related points, not even on the same debate planet.

Not being able to distinguish between the nuance associated with the ebb and flow of logistics based cybernetic systems, thriving or suffering entropy as a result of, or in spite of homeostasis with other influencing factors and systems....with the difference in summarily labelling complexity as "Waah! Why no win button?!"

Is why this game is in the state it's in. It's probably why the Design Team, consistently fail to realise, when people are being serious, and when they are just being pathetic.

Well done, Commanders. It's that level of stupid, that makes people balk at the thought of a Community Council and why so many have their mindsboggled by Design Decisions. I expect it from some, the fact this affectation is now creeping into the thought processes of some of the more rational amongst you. For me it's an indication of exactly how starved of creativity the development of this game is.

You should all just give up and go play something else.




HAHA! See what I did there? Went straight to the Idiot's Guide for advice on the fanatical view of why what I said is irrelevant.




Get a grip on your horses people. It's starting to sound desperate in here.

Look to the reasons why and check yourselves.

(2.8% of Regular Players, will consider themselves insulted at this statement)

 

[rootsrat]

Not being able to distinguish between the nuance associated with the ebb and flow of logistics based cybernetic systems, thriving or suffering entropy as a result of, or in spite of homeostasis with other influencing factors and systems....with the difference in summarily labelling complexity as "Waah! Why no win button?!"

Sorry, but my posts in this thread were a reply to a player that claimed that they are not happy with the game, because they are not able to fill their Orca with passenger missions to the same single destination system "even with board flipping" and then claimed that there is no point to big ships like Beluga because of that.

Perhaps my mistake was assuming that they also wanted a way to manually generate missions of their choice (aka "give me 20 passenger transport missions, all to the same system X") - they didn't actually say that and that was purely my assumption.

Saying that, there were A LOT of posts in this thread requesting just that for the very same reason, so while I did make a mistake of assuming the poster I was replying to also wanted that, my replies were not at all wrong, considering the amount of requests for that feature.

Where is this complexity you speak about in that?

I'm all for more complex mission system, with enhanced generation criteria, more suitable goals and rewards (ones that actually make sense), chained missions that tell an actual story as a whole package and so on. But I will always oppose silly ideas like an ability to get the exact missions YOU want - as opposed to all the other players in that system, who most probably each have a different goals and requirements, because that is indeed nothing more than "i-Win" button.

 

[Genus]

Where is this complexity you speak about in that?

I agree. It's not been talked about much. Outside of PM's it seems.

I'm all for more complex mission system, with enhanced generation criteria, more suitable goals and rewards (ones that actually make sense), chained missions that tell an actual story as a whole package and so on.

Sounds good. Also, fixing the BGS so that demand is able to cover capability at some point would be fabulous. Pre-fabricated decision points are so 1990's. Especially when they are accidental.

 

[Six6VI]

Yes, for two different companies. Not one of them gave any jobs to a random guy with a truck that showed up at the front desk.

Everyone you currently know, was once a stranger...

Random guy with truck shows up at company front desk, not the loading dock.
Random guy with truck comes back later, "got anything going north?" "Um, no!"
Not so random guy comes back again, going east. "Oh hi, can you take this?"
Delivery completed, promptly and in good order...
Bob pops in. "Hi Mary, going west today." "Too late, the regular guy took it all."
Bob pops in. "Are you going south Bob?" "Yep, can I help?" "Perfect timing, yay!"
Delivery completed promptly and in good order... DING!! Level up to Cordial.
Bob pops in. "Bob, give me your number, and arrive an hour earlier tomorrow."

As pilots, we're all engaged in selling our services and building client rapport.

Even if you call them from the yellow pages, it's still a random truck driver...